Butte semi-weekly miner. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1886-1890, 1887-03-16
Secretary whitney Explains the Dock

yard Bu6iness.
WASHINGTON, March 11.@SeeretarY Whit
ney to-day furnished q statement touching
the method employed by the Navy De-
partment to procure plans for naval yes
sells and machinery, reported as leading to
the discharge of Draughtsman Terry. at
Chatham dockyard. England. He says
there is no statement which connects the
Navy Department with anything clandes-
tine in the way of obtaining plans abroad
or secrets of a foreign government. 1t is
the business OF every government to know
what Implements of war are possessed by
others, together with their characteristics.
and the information can be easily obtained
il necessary. Trouble is taken without the
necessity of resortinx to any questionable
method. Relative to the purchase by the
department of designs made by
Chief Instructor White OF Eng
lish Admiralty. Secretary Whitney
says that White was not Chief Constructor
of the Admiralty when he made and the
department purchased the designs, but
that he was in the employ Of Sir William
Armstrong & Co. The Secretary quotes
from Secretary Chandler's annual report
of high commendation of the firm. He
then proceeds as follows; AFTER the
construction Of the Esmeralda
they built the Maniwa Kan for the
Japanese Government. which is an i'm
proved Esmeralda, Inc On her trial she was
reported to have made nineteen knots, the
highest speed then reached by any unarmed
cruiser. I decided to purchase working
drawings OF this ship and her machinery for
the purpose of placing them at the disposal
of our naval architects to see by
what method they attained SO
much greater speed over there than
we were able to reach here.
While the matter was negotiated, Arm
strong through their name architect, Mr..
White. made q still later design which is
called No. 81 which they offered in COM
petition to the Spanish Government from
which they guaranteed either 10 or 19k
sci being somewhat larger than Maniwa
Kau. This design was not rejected
by the Spanish Government although
in competition it did not win. Thompson
having agreed to guarantee twenty. knots
speed upon a boat of larger displacement
vas given a contract, and ia now building
a boat for the Spanish Government. The
boat which Thompson proposed to the
Spanish Government was out of question
for the United States because it was too
large in tonnage and too e1;
by the statutes, and I should not nave
bought the plans of that boat at the same
price. They were offered to us at the price
Of $5O,O 600. which offer 1 rejected and pre-
ferred the design of Armstrong & White.
finally closed a contract for plans of
two boats-the Maniwa Kan and what.
is known as No. 27-for $50 5000 less
than it would have cost them.
l think it was for the purpose
of laying before our people the latest i'm
provement in the way Of fast cruisers OF q
concern supposed to be the best construc-
tors in the world among private ship build
ers Of this class of boats. The machinery
of the Maniwa Kan was a design of Haw-
thorne's and that of No. ~ a de-
sign of Messrs. Humphreys and Ten
nant, recognized as concerns ranking
with the highest in England in the way
of marine machinery. After these plans
had been received here, l was frequently ap-
piled to by our ship builders to let them
lave copies. It was the first time that de-
tailed working drawings had been had as
to an entire ship and it then occurred to
me that it would be an excellent plan to
reproduce the machinery of these two YES
sells in two of five ships that we were about
to build and this curse was earnestly
urged upon me.